Use of current regulators to control the current pulses of a light emitting diode (LED) in a strobe application has the advantage of simplicity and minimal radiated emissions, however they can be inefficient. Maximum efficiency is achieved when the input voltage to the LED is close to the forward voltage (Vf) of the LED. Ideally the input voltage to the current regulator should be set to be slightly above the total Vf of the LED. In practice, this poses a problem because the input voltage required to drive the LEDs (i.e. Vf) will vary with temperature and from LED to LED. As a result, the Vf may drift over time with continued use.
Present applications apply an overdrive voltage such that the input voltage is much higher than the total Vf due to the varying voltage requirements across a plurality of LEDs. This method plans for the worst case scenario to ensure that the strobe's LEDs will have enough voltage to activate in a strobe application. Therefore, the overdrive voltage provides much more input voltage than needed because currently there is no way of identifying how much input voltage is sufficient to activate the strobe's LEDs. However, applying an overdrive voltage is inefficient and leads to large amounts of wasted energy in the form of dissipated heat.